I Was Put Here For a Purpose
My "experience" is working with a co-author to write a book called "Be Whole Now" (a tilt of the hat to Ram Dass's Be Here Now). While the main focus of the book-in-progress is techniques for increasing one's sense of "wholeness," my co-author, Pascal Soliquentes (not sure about the spelling of his last name), felt we needed a workable definition of wholeness in the early sections of the book.
While the account is not a first person account, it reflects the insights that the process of writing can bring our way. I am thankful for these insights. Hopefully they increase my "wisdom." Whether they do or not, the process of getting myself and others to critically examine the form and function and experience of wholeness is a major part of my "calling," or PURPOSE in life. I am a spiritual philosopher. Although didactically presented, the insights shared below affect my being and guide my attempts to "Be Whole."
Here is the definition for wholeness that I came up with. Notice that "PURPOSE" is an important part of the definition.
Wholeness = When all your main₁ parts are in a position₂ to work together to achieve your PURPOSE₃ in life₄.
1. Of a potential count of millions or trillions of “parts,” there appears to be three main areas within which most (if not all) of those many, many parts operate:
a. personal maintenance (survival)
b. relationships (love)
c. growth (evolution)
2. “Position” here means state of readiness or capacity, rather than specific location (although that too could be a determinant of readiness in some cases). There are two kinds of “position”:
a. the part itself is healthy and ready to perform as needed;
b. the body/mind system is ready/capable of using that part (is not rejecting or ignoring the part).
3. “PURPOSE” is a largely sensed, subjective, criteria, and one which may change over time. Under the main part of “growth” is what might be playfully called a “purpose percolator” which constantly brews, or bubbles up, one’s sense of purpose and/or one’s “calling.” Even though the purpose is percolated under the main part of growth, it is usually (if not always) played out in relationship. This is because we feel useful and purposeful when serving others or something bigger (more significant) than “little old me.”
4. “Life” has three main meanings:
a. your life “as far as you can tell” right now (i.e. limited to your current seeing/sensing/knowing capacity and in accordance with your particular filters). This meaning applies to the “now” part of “Be Whole Now”;
b. your life as a whole journey already traveled/lived up to that point. This meaning applies to an historical appraisal of wholeness, although it can also point to an appraisal of how whole you are currently (or recently), as compared to the rest of your alreadycompleted life’s journey;
c. life in general, existence, including all other (past, current, or future) lives besides your own.
My playful alternative definition of wholeness: “Love your liver and live your lover.”
Translation: Take care of your parts (actual physical parts— like liver, spleen, heart, lungs, etc.—as well as less physical, functional, aspects of your self) but also devote your life to your relationship with others, including your relationship with life itself (and/or with “God”).
Awareness of the Big Three:
Why is awareness important?
Because if you lack awareness of any (or all) of the three above parts, or aspects, or domains, of yourself, then you’ll be flying blind, and it will be much less likely that you can continue to head in the direction of wholeness.
Are you aware of how well you meet your need to maintain your existence?
Let’s use personal finance as an example.
In a world requiring money to survive it is important that you can tell if you are financially solvent or too broke to meet your basic needs. You may not understand exactly why you are “broke” (perhaps you suck at budgeting or other areas of personal finance), or you may be in that condition by choice (perhaps you’d rather be a starving artist who finds what you do to be highly authentic and meaningful than a “sell out” who has little or no meaningfulness in her life).
But if you have any chance to survive, you need to be realistically aware of your financial status. Otherwise you’ll be at high risk to starve to death, or you’ll become so frustrated (and hungry!) that you just can’t see straight. You can’t think clearly enough to pursue growth or to maintain meaningful relationships.
If you are poor by choice, at least you can work around it much better than if you are poor by ignorance or powerlessness. If by choice, you can better prioritize how you can “get by” or “make ends meet” on whatever limited income you have. And you will be much more likely to find creative ways to “work around” your relative poverty. Perhaps you will make friends who are patrons of the arts and who treat you to a nice meal now and then just in order to enjoy the company of a truly authentic person (not to say that all authentic people are poor, but some do fall in that category).
But if you are clueless or in denial about your state of poverty, then it is much more likely that your lack of money and means will bleed over into the other two main “parts” of your life. The bleed-over will then contaminate your effectiveness in those two areas as well.
Let’s suppose instead that you are financially well off, but are so busy playing the make-a-living game that you forgot how to pursue personal meaning. You failed to “grow” in existential areas.
The main part called “growth” is weak (at least in the existential/spiritual area of that main part), even though you have highly developed the part called personal maintenance (at least in the financial area of that “part”).
You might even feel like a hollow person or a person who is out of touch with his or her spirit. The “span” is there, but no real depth.
If you can be honest with yourself (instead of being too ashamed to admit to self and/or others that you are self-alienated or spiritually wounded), and can achieve the necessary awareness of your existential “poverty,” then you could use your money to enrol in spiritual services. Many wealthy people do things like fly to India to seek out a guru. Or you can support your church financially so that it will be there to in turn support you in your quest for spiritual growth.
But these options are more likely to be used if you are aware of your weak area.
Or lets suppose you are doing fine in both personal maintenance and in growth (spiritual or otherwise) but you are lonely because you just haven’t developed sustainable forms of psychologically intimate relationships. If you are aware of the loneliness then you could use your strengths in the other two areas (maintenance and growth) to focus on human intimacy or other forms of “relationship.” Perhaps your confidence in the area of personal growth could be put to use to grow in your relationship skills.
Maybe you have plenty of casual friends but have hidden emotional issues (“shadow” issues) which end up interfering with more intimate relationships.
You could use psychotherapy to “grow” in the area of emotional depth and healing.
After just a few examples, it becomes clear that the main “parts” are not strictly stand-alone parts. We just mentioned the possibility of needing to grow in the area of emotional processing and emotional wholeness, even in a person who has successfully invested in, and achieved, in personal growth in general. Growth and maintenance be needed in relationship areas, and good relationships can help with personal growth/transcendance needs, as well as with personal maintenance needs.
The three big “parts” are not homogeneous wholes in and of themselves. They each have subparts and are each interconnected and interdependent with one another.
In other words, the three big parts are not solid objects like rocks, paper and scissors. Nor are they just physical body parts like bladders, stomachs, and intestines. The three big parts are much more open and dynamic than physical “things.”
And yet there is sufficient consistency to think of them as parts. Growth taps into innate transcendance needs. A person who is focusing on transcendance is in a kind of journey mode which is distinct from the “settling” mode of maintenance.
And a focus on relationships seems to be able to happen whether you are on the road or at the destination. Relationships and relating seem like a different mode than either traveling or settling.
While the three main parts are by no means pure factors, they do appear to be different enough—to account for enough “variance”—to qualify as being different (and worthwhile, or “needed”) parts. Perhaps these “parts” are of the variety that might best be classified as modes.
Growth is an investment mode. Maintenance is a management mode. And relating/relationship is a mode that seems to have something to do with cooperation and morale.
Also, maintenance seems to be related to the process of replication. Growth seems related to the process of innovation. And relating/relationship seems related to the process of integration. If a good relationship can be achieve between replication and innovation, then wholeness seems to
follow.
However, relating/relationship is not limited to only integrating the other two main “parts” or modes. Relating/relationship helps integrate many other “parts” as well. Relating/relationship has some sort of a harmonizing effect in general which tends to facilitate integration and wholeness
in systems. A philosopher named Koestler (who is both referenced and revered by Ken Wilber) called it “communion.”
Koestler’s concept of “agency” would seem to apply to the two other “parts” of maintenance (replication) and growth (innovation).
Or something like that. We don’t have to get it completely right to get on the same page and begin to function in a more effective and whole sort of way. Even if the three proposed parts of self are more myth than objectively real, at least we can use them here as a “meaningful myth” (Joseph Campbell) and as a useful myth to help us develop wholeness.
Awareness of these “parts” is one thing. Awareness of how they interact is another. We have already suggested one significant way that they interact; they are the dynamic trio of replication, innovation, and integration.
In Allsville Emerging, I sensed three evolutionary stages or levels of “intelligence.”
What I called “level one intelligence” is mostly replication of tried and true tools/strategies. It often manifests itself in the form of conservativism. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”
What I called “level two intelligence” is mostly innovation. “Find or develop more effective tools and strategies and systems.”
What I called “level three intelligence” is mostly integration. The whole-mind activity that I called “The Master Tool” (or the mind as a whole) transcends and includes the previous two levels of intelligence. It adds the depth and breadth of communion to the two agentic modes of maintenance and growth—replication and innovation. “Use an integral (not necessarily Ken Wilber’s specific version of ‘integral,’ but integral nonetheless) approach to seeing, doing and being.”
I’ll leave it up to you to explore other dynamic interactions, or “dances” between your big three.
Darrell
While the account is not a first person account, it reflects the insights that the process of writing can bring our way. I am thankful for these insights. Hopefully they increase my "wisdom." Whether they do or not, the process of getting myself and others to critically examine the form and function and experience of wholeness is a major part of my "calling," or PURPOSE in life. I am a spiritual philosopher. Although didactically presented, the insights shared below affect my being and guide my attempts to "Be Whole."
Here is the definition for wholeness that I came up with. Notice that "PURPOSE" is an important part of the definition.
Wholeness = When all your main₁ parts are in a position₂ to work together to achieve your PURPOSE₃ in life₄.
1. Of a potential count of millions or trillions of “parts,” there appears to be three main areas within which most (if not all) of those many, many parts operate:
a. personal maintenance (survival)
b. relationships (love)
c. growth (evolution)
2. “Position” here means state of readiness or capacity, rather than specific location (although that too could be a determinant of readiness in some cases). There are two kinds of “position”:
a. the part itself is healthy and ready to perform as needed;
b. the body/mind system is ready/capable of using that part (is not rejecting or ignoring the part).
3. “PURPOSE” is a largely sensed, subjective, criteria, and one which may change over time. Under the main part of “growth” is what might be playfully called a “purpose percolator” which constantly brews, or bubbles up, one’s sense of purpose and/or one’s “calling.” Even though the purpose is percolated under the main part of growth, it is usually (if not always) played out in relationship. This is because we feel useful and purposeful when serving others or something bigger (more significant) than “little old me.”
4. “Life” has three main meanings:
a. your life “as far as you can tell” right now (i.e. limited to your current seeing/sensing/knowing capacity and in accordance with your particular filters). This meaning applies to the “now” part of “Be Whole Now”;
b. your life as a whole journey already traveled/lived up to that point. This meaning applies to an historical appraisal of wholeness, although it can also point to an appraisal of how whole you are currently (or recently), as compared to the rest of your alreadycompleted life’s journey;
c. life in general, existence, including all other (past, current, or future) lives besides your own.
My playful alternative definition of wholeness: “Love your liver and live your lover.”
Translation: Take care of your parts (actual physical parts— like liver, spleen, heart, lungs, etc.—as well as less physical, functional, aspects of your self) but also devote your life to your relationship with others, including your relationship with life itself (and/or with “God”).
Awareness of the Big Three:
Why is awareness important?
Because if you lack awareness of any (or all) of the three above parts, or aspects, or domains, of yourself, then you’ll be flying blind, and it will be much less likely that you can continue to head in the direction of wholeness.
Are you aware of how well you meet your need to maintain your existence?
Let’s use personal finance as an example.
In a world requiring money to survive it is important that you can tell if you are financially solvent or too broke to meet your basic needs. You may not understand exactly why you are “broke” (perhaps you suck at budgeting or other areas of personal finance), or you may be in that condition by choice (perhaps you’d rather be a starving artist who finds what you do to be highly authentic and meaningful than a “sell out” who has little or no meaningfulness in her life).
But if you have any chance to survive, you need to be realistically aware of your financial status. Otherwise you’ll be at high risk to starve to death, or you’ll become so frustrated (and hungry!) that you just can’t see straight. You can’t think clearly enough to pursue growth or to maintain meaningful relationships.
If you are poor by choice, at least you can work around it much better than if you are poor by ignorance or powerlessness. If by choice, you can better prioritize how you can “get by” or “make ends meet” on whatever limited income you have. And you will be much more likely to find creative ways to “work around” your relative poverty. Perhaps you will make friends who are patrons of the arts and who treat you to a nice meal now and then just in order to enjoy the company of a truly authentic person (not to say that all authentic people are poor, but some do fall in that category).
But if you are clueless or in denial about your state of poverty, then it is much more likely that your lack of money and means will bleed over into the other two main “parts” of your life. The bleed-over will then contaminate your effectiveness in those two areas as well.
Let’s suppose instead that you are financially well off, but are so busy playing the make-a-living game that you forgot how to pursue personal meaning. You failed to “grow” in existential areas.
The main part called “growth” is weak (at least in the existential/spiritual area of that main part), even though you have highly developed the part called personal maintenance (at least in the financial area of that “part”).
You might even feel like a hollow person or a person who is out of touch with his or her spirit. The “span” is there, but no real depth.
If you can be honest with yourself (instead of being too ashamed to admit to self and/or others that you are self-alienated or spiritually wounded), and can achieve the necessary awareness of your existential “poverty,” then you could use your money to enrol in spiritual services. Many wealthy people do things like fly to India to seek out a guru. Or you can support your church financially so that it will be there to in turn support you in your quest for spiritual growth.
But these options are more likely to be used if you are aware of your weak area.
Or lets suppose you are doing fine in both personal maintenance and in growth (spiritual or otherwise) but you are lonely because you just haven’t developed sustainable forms of psychologically intimate relationships. If you are aware of the loneliness then you could use your strengths in the other two areas (maintenance and growth) to focus on human intimacy or other forms of “relationship.” Perhaps your confidence in the area of personal growth could be put to use to grow in your relationship skills.
Maybe you have plenty of casual friends but have hidden emotional issues (“shadow” issues) which end up interfering with more intimate relationships.
You could use psychotherapy to “grow” in the area of emotional depth and healing.
After just a few examples, it becomes clear that the main “parts” are not strictly stand-alone parts. We just mentioned the possibility of needing to grow in the area of emotional processing and emotional wholeness, even in a person who has successfully invested in, and achieved, in personal growth in general. Growth and maintenance be needed in relationship areas, and good relationships can help with personal growth/transcendance needs, as well as with personal maintenance needs.
The three big “parts” are not homogeneous wholes in and of themselves. They each have subparts and are each interconnected and interdependent with one another.
In other words, the three big parts are not solid ob
And yet there is sufficient consistency to think of them as parts. Growth taps into innate transcendance needs. A person who is focusing on transcendance is in a kind of journey mode which is distinct from the “settling” mode of maintenance.
And a focus on relationships seems to be able to happen whether you are on the road or at the destination. Relationships and relating seem like a different mode than either traveling or settling.
While the three main parts are by no means pure factors, they do appear to be different enough—to account for enough “variance”—to qualify as being different (and worthwhile, or “needed”) parts. Perhaps these “parts” are of the variety that might best be classified as modes.
Growth is an investment mode. Maintenance is a management mode. And relating/relationship is a mode that seems to have something to do with cooperation and morale.
Also, maintenance seems to be related to the process of replication. Growth seems related to the process of innovation. And relating/relationship seems related to the process of integration. If a good relationship can be achieve between replication and innovation, then wholeness seems to
follow.
However, relating/relationship is not limited to only integrating the other two main “parts” or modes. Relating/relationship helps integrate many other “parts” as well. Relating/relationship has some sort of a harmonizing effect in general which tends to facilitate integration and wholeness
in systems. A philosopher named Koestler (who is both referenced and revered by Ken Wilber) called it “communion.”
Koestler’s concept of “agency” would seem to apply to the two other “parts” of maintenance (replication) and growth (innovation).
Or something like that. We don’t have to get it completely right to get on the same page and begin to function in a more effective and whole sort of way. Even if the three proposed parts of self are more myth than ob
Awareness of these “parts” is one thing. Awareness of how they interact is another. We have already suggested one significant way that they interact; they are the dynamic trio of replication, innovation, and integration.
In Allsville Emerging, I sensed three evolutionary stages or levels of “intelligence.”
What I called “level one intelligence” is mostly replication of tried and true tools/strategies. It often manifests itself in the form of conservativism. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”
What I called “level two intelligence” is mostly innovation. “Find or develop more effective tools and strategies and systems.”
What I called “level three intelligence” is mostly integration. The whole-mind activity that I called “The Master Tool” (or the mind as a whole) transcends and includes the previous two levels of intelligence. It adds the depth and breadth of communion to the two agentic modes of maintenance and growth—replication and innovation. “Use an integral (not necessarily Ken Wilber’s specific version of ‘integral,’ but integral nonetheless) approach to seeing, doing and being.”
I’ll leave it up to you to explore other dynamic interactions, or “dances” between your big three.
Darrell
Age:
56-60
,
Male
